The Portal

Chapter 13 – Welcome to Our Home

Sesshomaru walked behind Kagome as they followed the human’s back to their village. Thoughts of what these humans would reveal to them played through his mind... amongst other things. One thing that bothered him mostly, was the swaying bounce of Kagome’s beautifully sculptured derrière. With every single step that the miko took, her delicious flesh just beckoned for his touch. He found that he was extremely glad that he had taken the lead on their journey up to this point, otherwise he would not have gotten very far. The word ‘Princess’, moved with her hips, and the longer that he stared, the more positive he became that she was as far from a princess as she could get. Possibly ‘Hells Spawn’ would have been better? Only a child of Hell could torture a man with no regard, and Kagome cared not what she was doing to him.

Naraku was enjoying the show as well, it would seem. Although the hanyou was rather quiet, Sesshomaru caught him glaring from the corner of his eye. He had to force down the urge to rip the filthy vermin’s eyes out. What infuriated Sesshomaru most of all, was that he cared. Why should he care that Naraku watched the girl?

The creature at Kagome’s feet made it a habit to periodically rub against her legs, as if it were of the feline persuasion. It seemed to have given up on trying to attach himself to her, for which Sesshomaru found a bit of gratitude. He pondered on the creature’s actions since they had found it. It had definitely taken a liking to the miko, almost obsessively. Not unlike himself, although he was loathe to admit that. Tala’s transformation was certainly a surprise. He thought the beast to be a mindless nuisance, however its recent actions proved that it would be a fiercely protective guardian. That thought lead him to wonder if Kagome had indeed found the pet, or perhaps Tala had found her? Sesshomaru decided that it really didn’t matter much to him either way, as long as someone in this Kami-forsaken place could tell them how to get home.

Kagome walked along quietly, thinking of her current situation. It was all too confusing, and the longer that they were here, the more confused she became. Even her little friendly, if not slightly hentai pet Tala, had turned out nothing like she expected. Imagine her surprise at seeing her furry pal turn into a fiercely hissing beast! Kagome leaned down and rubbed his head, eliciting a grunting purr in return. He had calmed down considerably once Kagome agreed to follow the humans. It seemed to her that he was unusually protective over her. Could all of this be over a case of mistaken identity? Did they assume that she was this person simply because Tala had decided to befriend her?

The thick forests parted ahead and Kagome soon emerged into the bright sunlight. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust, but as soon as they did, she was able to see the human village. It was really huge, and not much at all like the huts of feudal Japan. Where the huts of Inuyasha’s time were mostly bamboo, grasses, and wood, these huts were more elaborate and mostly consisted of clay and stone. On the roof of each one were rows of huge dried leaves tied atop bamboo poles. She could see huge clay pots sitting around areas with large outdoor ovens.

Kagome could see fields in the distance, which appeared to host a variety of grains. She caught sight of a few work animals, which she could not name, simply because she had never laid eyes on anything like them before. ‘Where are we,’ she thought for the thousandth time in two days.

Her meandering thoughts were soon forgotten when the squeals of excited children reached her ears. Kagome smiled at the young ones who had gathered to catch a glimpse of the new visitors. It was strange that they stayed so far away. Usually village childeren would waste no time in running right up to her. Soon many adults ran to greet them, and Kagome was shocked when the elders quickly scolded the children as they pulled them down to bow low to the ground next to them. Every single person they passed by immediately fell down as if in worship at her feet. Kagome just didn’t know what to make of this.

The progression soon arrived at a relatively large villa, which had a huge sheltered veranda and beautiful potted red flowers adorning it. An old woman appeared, followed by two middle aged gentleman, and several young women and children. This had to be the headmaster’s home, and once again Kagome was astounded when these people also dropped to the ground in respect of her. An irritated growl escaped behind her, causing Kagome to remember her inuyoukai companion, who obviously was a bit jealous. She looked back and sent him a teasing smile, before returning her gaze to the people bowing at her feet.

“Please, rise. I believe that there is some sort of misunderstanding,” Kagome began.

“I certainly agree with that,” Sesshomaru interjected.

Kagome only ignored the jab from her inu companion, and continued with her pleas to rise. Tala, although he was sticking extremely close by her side, was behaving himself with these people, and she gave him a comforting pat on the head.

Finally the humans deemed it appropriate to rise and Kagome quickly stepped to assist the elder woman, who was struggling a bit to stand. The old woman looked shocked, yet pleased, and smiled to her as she gave her a hearty pat on the hand. Immediately following their rise the humans turned to Sesshomaru and gave a deep plunging bow, then one of the men stepped forward and greeted them.

“Welcome to our village, son of Lord Anubis.” He turned to Kagome and did the same. “Welcome daughter of our revered God Horus. I am the headmaster here. My name is Mizuto.”

Well, if Kagome and Sesshomaru were confused before, they were now doubly so. These people had really come to the wrong conclusion.

Sesshomaru grew tired of all this. He stepped forward and proceeded to straighten them out in a few things. “You are greatly mistaken human. I am Lord Sesshomaru, ruler of the Western Territories of Japan. I am the son of the great dog general InuTaisho, and this, he pointed to Kagome, is just a human miko, and not even that good of one.”

Kagome ignored the surrounding gasps from the crowd and turned on her companion. “Hey! How dare you! It’s not my fault I’m untrained! I might be able to fine tune my skills a little better if YOUR brother would give me a break once in a while!”

Sesshomaru glared at her. Once again she dares defy him in front of onlookers. “Half brother, and was it not you, miko, who shattered the Shikon jewel in the first place?”

His condescending tone only sparked her anger further, but before she could retaliate Naraku stepped forward completely ignoring her and Sesshomaru. “Greetings. I am Lord Naraku, also of Japan. May I inquire as to where we are?”

The headmaster, who’s jaw was hanging open as he stared openly at the arguing inuyoukai and the beautiful Exalted One, turned to Naraku and answered, “Of course, my... lord.” He looked a little confused that Naraku could be a lord, but continued his answer, “You are in the providence of Abu Simbel.”

That caught Kagome’s attention briefly. She had heard of Abu Simbel. Wasn’t that in Egypt? She processed this for a minute, and then asked the headmaster another question. “What planet is this?”

The headmaster did not hide his confusion very well, but answered promptly, “This is of course, the planet Karnak.”

Kagome wavered a bit, upon receiving his answer. “Karnak?” She turned to Sesshomaru, who had his normal mask of indifference firmly in place as he stared absently at the ground in deep thought. She glanced to Naraku, who was doing the very same thing. Suddenly she felt the impending panic of the previous two days burst forth.

Sesshomaru was jerked from his thoughts on how in the hell they were to escape this dreaded planet, by a pitiful whimpering sound. He glanced around quickly and soon noticed that Kagome’s tough persona had broken. She now looked like a frightened child who had lost their mother. Tears were coursing down her face, and for some unknown reason he did something, that once again, was completely out of character. Sesshomaru stepped up to her and pulled her into his arms, where he held her close as he lightly stroked her hair.

Sesshomaru looked up and noticed that every single human was staring at them with looks of complete astonishment written on their faces. He chose to ignore them, as he had no intentions of staying in this place anyway, and tried to comfort the distraught miko. “Kagome, calm yourself. This Sesshomaru will find a way to bring us home. You have my word as Lord of the Western Lands.”

Kagome sniffled a little, and tried to wipe the tears from her eyes. The events of the past days had just crashed down on her and she just couldn’t seem to quell the tears right at this moment. She was greatly thankful that Sesshomaru was trying to lend her some comfort, and she had to admit that being pressed against his warm muscular chest did wonders to distract her from her grief. Although, when he issued his promise to find a way to return them to their home, she couldn’t help but wonder if he could really live up to his word. In her mind, she knew him as the most powerful being alive... in feudal Japan, but could he live up to that in this strange new place?

Naraku finally had enough of the show of affection between his rival and the woman that he had hoped to make his own. “Could you two possibly pull yourselves together. This is simply disgusting to behold. A whimpering miko and a sympathetic taiyoukai. How the mighty have fallen.”

Mizuto watched the display with astonished curiosity. An inuyoukai was comforting the Exalted One? He couldn’t believe his eyes. Furthermore, her pet was allowing it! What strange circumstances indeed. The one called Naraku had introduced himself as a lord, and that was simply impossible. No hanyou was a lord, and shockingly the son of Anubis made no move to discipline the hanyou for speaking out of line. This group before him went against all that he knew to be true. He had to get them away from the gathering crowd, where he could find out more about them. “Come, my lords, and my lady, follow me. I will have my daughters take you to the baths. Then we can discuss everything over a hearty meal.”

Sesshomaru released Kagome, with a gentle push to get her moving in the right direction. He sent a death glare to Naraku for his scathing remark earlier, before he fell in line to accept the human’s hospitality. He would rather just get to the point, but after finding out that they were actually not on Earth, he figured another hour was not going to make that much of a difference.

The bathhouses were located at the back of the main villa, and Sesshomaru was impressed at the design. These humans had managed to harness the use of a jungle estuary, by diverting the water flow to the huge baked tubs. Fires were built around the tubs, thus warming the damned up water, which could easily be emptied by releasing the sliding wall. By replacing the wall, the water could once again fill the tubs and become warm for the luxury of the one’s bathing. It appeared that this was the only bathhouse, as it was very large, and consisted of four separate bathing facilities. ‘Interesting design,’ Sesshomaru thought. ‘I may order one to be constructed at the Palace of the Moon’.

Kagome was all to glad to have a nice hot bath, and she followed the two girls, who led her to the farther most bathing room. She was grateful for the grass partitions, which offered her some amount of privacy. The young girl’s tried to assist her in removing her clothing, but Kagome refused adamantly, and shooed them out.

Sesshomaru stepped into the bathing house followed by two lovely young human women. They each assisted in removing his hakama’s, and giggled in delight at his powerful body. He basically ignored this, until they climbed in the bath with him. He was just short of telling them that he refused to bathe with humans, when one of them began scrubbing his back with a wonderfully rough dried plant. He decided to allow this, and relaxed somewhat. The second girl, who had delightfully light colored hair, positioned herself to cleanse his snow-white tresses. She stepped forward and began working her tiny fingers through his scalp and Sesshomaru felt many of his worries washing away. He opened his eyes to be greeted by two bouncing breasts glistening with water a mere fraction from his face. The temptation was just too great and he sucked the closest pert nipple into his mouth, which earned him a delightful squeal from the ningen girl.

Bath time ended all to soon and the lovely young women were all too pleased to thoroughly dry the tall lord demon’s body of water. A red silk Kimono was offered with a pair of matching hakama’s, which Sesshomaru briefly contemplated refusing. It looked a bit too much like something Inuyasha would wear.

He was led back into the villa where Kagome was waiting patiently with Tala wound around her feat. Naraku, however was nowhere to be seen. Sesshomaru joined the miko and was soon served tea, by the same light haired wench who assisted in his bath. She giggled and blushed as she poured his tea, which earned him a steely glare from Kagome.

“Just what was that all about?” Kagome asked suspiciously.

“Can this Sesshomaru help that women find him attractive?”

Kagome rolled her eyes at the arrogance portrayed and picked up her cup to take another sip. She grew angry with herself for letting that little display affect her. She could not believe that she was actually jealous over Sesshomaru! She had no right. What in the world was she thinking?

Sesshomaru certainly did look very handsome in the red silk, and Kagome couldn’t help but to think briefly of Inuyasha. She wondered how he was doing, and hoped that he wasn’t too worried about her.

Naraku finally made an appearance, with two happily blushing young women wrapped underneath each arm. That was the first time she could remember actually seeing a smile on his face, and Kagome didn’t have to do much guessing as to what took him so long. She glanced to him as he took a seat beside her, and couldn’t help but to cock an eyebrow at his behavior. He only returned the look, and leaned close to her, whispering in his dark silken tone, “Do you wish to know my hidden talents, as well, Kagome?”

Kagome gasped in shock, and whispered fiercely, “Hentai!”

Sesshomaru, glared at Naraku, “You would do well to hold your tongue, vermin.”

“Why Lord Sesshomaru, do I detect a hint of jealousy over this human miko?” Naraku stabbed in his question.

Sesshomaru growled with bared fangs, and Kagome suddenly felt that she was not in the safest place she could be. Sitting between these two could become hazardous to her health, but before she could move, the headmaster and the old woman came into the room and seated themselves across from them.

“We hope that you have found our baths refreshing?” Mizuto asked. He then rang a little bell, and several platters of food were brought in my quiet children, who placed the trays on the table and began serving their guests.

The old woman watched their guests carefully. She could not understand the relationship between the lord demon and the Exalted One. The hanyou was also a mystery, as he exuded a great deal of power. No hanyou she had ever met held that much power. These talks were sure to be very enlightening.